64 GARDENS PAST AND PRESENT 



were grown by the Romans, amongst other garden 

 vegetables, merely on account of their decorative 

 value in wreaths and garlands, and possibly for 

 scent. Of planting a flower garden for its own 

 sake in those days there seems to have been little 

 idea; but it may be granted that there was a 

 certain congruity in the deep shadows and endur- 

 ing fitness of the clipped garden which accorded 

 well with fine statuary and the music of falling 

 water, in the glow and vivid colouring of the south. 

 Not so with us in the chill grey north. The rigid 

 severity of the style is too sombre for the ever- 

 recurring neutral tints which drift across our cloudy 

 skies. At Levens this has not been forgotten, for 

 the brilliant hues of larkspur, paeonies, roses, 

 hollyhocks, and a thousand flowers of the sort, 

 mingle with the dark, inflexible evergreens, and 

 chase away every suspicion of gloom by the magic 

 spell of changing form and colour. 



Wisely used, nevertheless, there is infinite beauty 

 and repose in the massive hedge of yew or holly, 

 whether close-clipped or not, which gave comfort 

 and shelter to many a garden belonging to a seven- 

 teenth-century manor or rectory house. More of 

 these than some may now care to remember have 

 been ruthlessly done away with, to make room 

 for " up-to-date " improvements so-called. Far 

 better would it have been for many a present-day 

 garden if this kind of formality had been respected. 

 The slow rate of growth in their early stages of 

 our finest evergreen trees, not to speak of the 

 labour of the shears, now too often prevents plant- 

 ing that would take years to mature, and so we 



